


a year together (or two or tree)

by renquise



Category: BTOB
Genre: M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-04-09
Updated: 2016-04-09
Packaged: 2018-06-01 07:15:01
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,109
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6508114
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/renquise/pseuds/renquise
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>The one where Eunkwang is a shepherd and Minhyuk is his hot dryad neighbour from across the field. Also, there are sheep.</p>
            </blockquote>





	a year together (or two or tree)

**Author's Note:**

> Entirely inspired by Minhyuk in a flower crown in [this photo.](http://renquise.tumblr.com/post/142258675402/btobnews-withmin-do-not-edit)

“I found your giant baby lamb again,” Minhyuk says cheerfully for the third time that week. 

Eunkwang looks up from counting his sheep. Sure enough, Minhyuk has his giant baby lamb across his shoulders again, gently clasping the lamb’s legs in a way that kind of looks artfully arranged to show off his biceps. It’s working. 

“Where was he this time, oh my god,” Eunkwang says. He’s pretty sure the lamb is doing it on purpose, at this point. He squints at it, trying to look intimidating and probably failing. “You’re going to get eaten by wolves, and both Minhyuk and I are going to be really sad, and I won’t even get to tell you that I told you so.”

The lamb blinks innocently and resumes eating the garland draped around its neck before changing its mind and going for the tumble of white pear tree flowers in Minhyuk’s hair. Eunkwang should probably admit that the lamb has been a full-grown sheep for at least a year, especially since it’s large enough to knock him over by now. 

Minhyuk hoists his lamb off his shoulders without any trouble, the lean muscles in his arms flexing. Eunkwang takes it from him and staggers under its weight. 

Eunkwang still doesn’t know how old Minhyuk is—his tree by the stream is solid and large, but the bark is smooth, and Minhyuk still looks just as good as when Eunkwang first found this field for grazing his sheep in the summer. Nobody mentioned that grazing a flock out here meant you had to deal with having a dryad neighbour hanging around, but Eunkwang really doesn’t mind. 

If anything, Minhyuk’s fascination with Eunkwang’s really boring sheep-centric life is weirdly flattering. It’s been years, and he still keeps on coming by to watch Eunkwang herd the sheep out to the field, disappearing over the winter and coming back with the spring.

“Nice garland. Your flowers are early this year, aren’t they? They look good!” Eunkwang tells Minhyuk as said garland disappears into the lamb.

“Thanks,” Minhyuk says with a little pleased smile, like he’s happy to hear something that he already knew, and waves to him before striding back across the field.

—

With spring comes shearing season, and Eunkwang is really glad to have Minhyuk around to hoist the sheep onto the shearing bench, the sheep calm in his hold while Eunkwang gets their winter fleece off.

“You do that really well,” Minhyuk says wonderingly, looking at Eunkwang’s hands. 

Eunkwang can’t help but puff up a little bit with pride. He’s getting a pretty close clip today, with lots of the good wool. 

“Phew. Okay, we just have to wash the fleeces, and that’ll be it,” Eunkwang says when Minhyuk hoists the last sheep off the bench and lets it go bounding off. They make a good team. 

Eunkwang gathers the fleeces in his arms and brings them to the stream, the sheep wandering around his feet and trying to trip him up. By the time he gets all the fleeces to the stream, Minhyuk is already waist-deep in an eddy, ducking his head under the water. He shakes his head and rakes his wet hair back, petals from the flowers in his hair scattered in his curls and sticking to the wet skin of his neck. 

“Oh man, I was thirsty,” Minhyuk says. His tunic is clinging to his skin, translucent over his chest. “It’s going to be a dry summer, I think. Hand me the wool?”

“Uh,” Eunkwang says. One of his sheep knocks him into the stream.

One of the first things that Eunkwang learned upon meeting Minhyuk was that the poets who said that dryads were shy were super, extremely wrong.

“I could become a poet. I'd be an awesome poet, right?” Eunkwang asks one of the sheep later. He’s definitely not staring at Minhyuk stretched out in the sun between the white clouds of the drying fleeces, his tunic spread out beside him in the grass. 

The sheep bleats at him and is no help whatsoever.

—

The summer is hot and dry, as Minhyuk predicted, and the sheep spend most of their time crowded under the shade of the trees, along with Eunkwang. Even Minhyuk seems to be wilting a bit, the dark green leaves in his hair drooping over his ears. 

One of the sheep makes a half-hearted attempt at running away, wandering halfway across the field and then looking back at Eunkwang. Eunkwang waves at it and makes a sad face, because he’s way too hot to chase after it. Maybe guilting it into coming back will work. The sheep sighs and wanders back to the shade, and Minhyuk reaches over to pat Eunkwang’s shoulder.

“Good job on preventing that escape, master shepherd,” he says.

“Thanks. I am doing my utmost. Oh my god, how do your hands feel so nice,” Eunkwang says. It should be way too hot to have another person anywhere near him, but Minhyuk’s touch is still cool, like leaves in the shade. He catches Minhyuk’s cool hands and pushes his cheeks into them until they smoosh up around his lips. “Stay here forever so I don’t melt and die of heat prostration.”

Minhyuk laughs and smooshes up his cheeks even further with his hands. Eunkwang is pretty sure that he must smell terrible, like sheep and sweat, but Minhyuk doesn’t seem to mind. He bends close to Eunkwang, close enough that Eunkwang can see the thin sheen of sweat of his temples. He smells sweet, like pears on the verge of ripeness. 

Then he blows a raspberry on Eunkwang’s cheek, loud enough for the sheep to startle and run across the field, and they have to spend the rest of the day hunting them down again.

—

At the market next month, Eunkwang blows half of the money from his sheep’s cheese on an new water urn. 

“I got a good price for it, okay?” he tells the sheep standing in the doorway of his summer shack and judging him as he sets it first by the door, then on the table.

The urn was decorated with dudes wrestling and these really pretty pear trees, and he did not get a good price for it.

The sheep snorts and walks away. 

“It’s a _really nice_ urn!” Eunkwang shouts after its fluffy sarcastic butt.

Minhyuk grins and raises an eyebrow when he sees the urn, which makes it worth it, even if Minhyuk says it’s kind of ugly.

—

By the end of the summer, the branches of Minhyuk’s tree are bent heavy with pears, and by the tenth armful, even Minhyuk is looking a little sheepish at his tree’s enthusiasm.

“Amazing,” Eunkwang groans around the pear, hamming it up for all it’s worth. He’s getting good at selling the extra pears at the market. “The best thing I’ve ever tasted. I love your tree, Minhyuk.”

“Oh my god, close your mouth when you eat, that’s so gross,” Minhyuk says, rolling his eyes. He still looks proud, though. 

Eunkwang feels pear juice dripping down his chin, which must look super graceful and dignified. He wipes it off and licks it off his fingers. The pears are really juicy this year—sweet, too. He can feel Minhyuk staring at him and raises his eyebrows. 

“Uh,” Minhyuk stutters, rearranging the flowers in his hair. “Anyway. I’m glad you aren’t sick of them yet.”

Eunkwang has five more armfuls of pears to deal with by the end of the week.

—

The next time Eunkwang sees Minhyuk, the sheep are back down from the summer fields and Minhyuk has gold leaves woven through his hair.

“That’s the last of them this year, I think,” Minhyuk says, dumping another armful of pears onto the table. He looks kind of groggy, the way he always does around this time of year, ready to turn in and sleep for the winter.

“Yeah, it’s getting cold. Hey, does your tree get cold during the winter?” Eunkwang says. “I could like. Knit it a scarf or something.” He can’t tell if he wants Minhyuk to take him up on it. On one hand, he really does want Minhyuk to be warm enough. On the other hand, he’s terrible at knitting.

“Nah, thanks,” Minhyuk says. “The wool’s bad for the bark and my skin breaks out, and I look terrible.” Minhyuk ducks his head, then, licking his lips. The light is already golden, the days already shorter. “You could come and say hi, though? I mean, I’ll probably be asleep, but, if you want to. You don’t have to, though,” he says. 

Eunkwang elbows him. “You know I always do,” he says, making an offended face. 

Eunkwang felt kind of dumb talking to the tree the first time he visited during the winter, squinting at it and wondering if Minhyuk was curled up in a hollow of the trunk to sleep. But winters are always kind of long and lonely, so every week, he wakes up early and hiked up to the grazing fields to say hi. 

This winter isn’t bad this year, not until it brings with it the coldest night they’ve had in years, cold enough that Eunkwang sleeps with the sheep, cold enough that he wakes up in the middle of the night from his own shaking, wind seeping through the cracks of his house. 

When Eunkwang wakes up that morning and opens the door, there’s a sheen of ice on everything, the dry yellow grass sparkling in the clear winter sun. It’s like nothing he’s ever seen before. And then, he can hear the trees cracking, branches snapping with the weight of ice, and his stomach drops into his feet.

He fumbles on as many layers as he can find, his hands shaking and the tips of his fingertips cold, tries to stay calm because the sheep can feel his panic, bleating and butting around his legs and almost escaping when he runs out the door, his breath white and the air burning in his lungs.

He leans over his knees and tries to catch his breath once he gets to the field, almost braining himself on a branch for the tenth time when he slips again.

Minhyuk’s tree has a thin sheen of ice on the bark and a scattering of snapped twigs coated with ice around the trunk. But the branches are as strong and smooth as ever, steady and whole.

Eunkwang swallows and presses a hand to the trunk of the tree, feeling the ice melt under his hand and the smooth, wet bark left underneath. 

“Hi,” Eunkwang says to the tree, his throat tight. “The sheep are getting antsy! One of them almost crushed me last night when it rolled over in its sleep. I think they miss you. I miss you. Winter seriously sucks, you know that?”

There’s no response, but he talks to the tree until his toes go numb. Spring can’t come soon enough.

—

The sheep are ready for shearing again by the time the first green shoots are on the trees, heavy and clumsy with the weight of the wool, bumping against each other in the pen and eager to get out to the fields, like they can smell the fresh greenness pushing through the dirt.

Eunkwang wraps a blanket around himself against the last touch of morning cold. He jumps, then, because someone just pushed open the door, and it’s been him and the sheep for the whole winter.

“Oof. I’m kind of stiff,” Minhyuk says, peeking in the door and stretching his arms above his head, tiny white buds peeking through the sleep-tousled curls of his hair, their petals still furled tight. “Seriously, it gets cramped in there after awhile. Oh my god, do you still have that ugly water urn?”

Eunkwang makes an embarrassing noise and catches Minhyuk up, swinging him around in a circle before putting him down because Minhyuk is actually pretty heavy, and then leans into him to kiss him. Minhyuk makes a desperately happy noise, leaning into Eunkwang and clasping him tight, like he needs the heat to get the last of winter’s chill out of his bones.

“I forgot that you smell like sheep,” Minhyuk says, wrinkling his nose, but he’s grinning, grinning wide enough to crinkle his eyes. He plucks one of the buds from his hair and tucks it behind Eunkwang’s ear. 

“Yeah, yeah,” Eunkwang says. He can’t stop grinning, either. 

Same as every year, except different, same as more years to come, Eunkwang hopes. They lead the sheep out to the fields, the flowers in Minhyuk’s hair opening to the sun.


End file.
